


Of Spring Returning

by Kariki



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Awkward!Hartley, Cruise, Domestic Fluff, Hartley doesn't know how to emotion, HartmonSpringFling2017, Hay Fever, M/M, Spring Break, Teenage Crush, copious amounts of snot, tags added as needed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-23
Updated: 2017-04-24
Packaged: 2018-10-22 23:24:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10707327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kariki/pseuds/Kariki
Summary: Written for the Hartmon Spring Fling on tumblrA series of short fics written in the same verse, one for each prompt.* * *The first time Hartley saw Cisco Ramon was on a cruise ship when he was just 16.





	1. Spring Break

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Hartmon Spring Fling 2017. I wasn't actually planning on writing anything for this but then my brain spewed out some ideas at the last minute. Oopsies.
> 
> Note: I changed the title because I realized I had a chance to make Spring Awakening references and, gdi, I'm taking those chances!

Hartley peeked over the edge of his book, careful to keep it almost suspiciously high and his face angled down so that his parents, sitting just a few feet away from him in their own deckchairs wouldn’t notice his distraction.

The boy on the lower deck looked to be about his age, sixteen or so, and he was gorgeous.

He had long dark hair down to his shoulders and darker skin that was glistening wet from the pool he had just climbed out of. He wasn’t particularly muscular but he wasn’t bad looking.

Hartley licked his lips and forced his eyes back to his book.

He still wasn’t sure why his parents had decided to go on a cruise instead of just taking the yacht out. Perhaps it was the novelty of it or the chance to buy the most expensive rooms and order the most expensive things in a place where there was an audience to admire how rich they were.

That was also a possibility.

Whatever the reason, it had left Hartley in a bit of a situation.

It was easier to pretend he wasn’t gay when there weren’t shirtless men surrounding him at all times of the day. He couldn’t help but sneak a peek at some of them and each look only made it harder to stop looking.

He glanced back up to see the boy he had been admiring climb up out of the pool, the boy’s florescent yellow swim trunks flashing in the Caribbean sunlight, as he started walking back toward a group of people Hartley could only assume was his family. They all had the same attractive hair and skin and the older boy in the group reached out and ruffled the cute boy’s long hair in a way that spoke of family.

“I’m going to go walk around,” Hartley announced, closing his book with a snap.

“Don’t wander too far,” his mother said, not looking up from her magazine. His father said nothing.

“I won’t,” Hartley said automatically, already walking down the deck, toward the elevators that would take him down to the lower deck.

He just... wanted a closer look. That’s all.

The elevator was crowded, of course, the smell of coconut-scented sunscreen and sweat making his nose wrinkle though he tried not to show it as he squeezed in anyway. The doors closed and he was reminded of another reason this was a bad idea.

The elevator doors were metallic and reflective and the scrawny teenager with too many freckles, floppy hair, and thick glasses showcased there was not appealing. Hartley bit his lip and looked away from his reflection, instead focusing on the numbers above the door.

‘I’m just going to walk around the pool a bit,’ Hartley told himself, watching the numbers slowly tick down. ‘That’s all. A quick walk and if I get a better look of that guy then... then...’

He didn’t let himself finish that thought. He wasn’t sure how he would finish it. 

What did it matter if he got a closer look at the other boy’s face? It’s not like he could do anything about it or like the boy would even be interested if he did. It was too big of a risk – either his parents finding out or the boy rejecting him (or worse). It wasn’t worth it.

This whole exercise was pointless and stupid and... and...

He was standing right there.

The elevator doors had opened and the darker boy in the bright swim trunks was standing right there. 

His eyes were dark like Hartley thought they’d be but they were warmer, smiling eyes. His face was soft and his teeth were bright when he smiled.

Hartley swallowed hard, his eyes wide.

The crowd around him started moving, going around Hartley and exiting the elevator. The other teenager and his family stood waiting to enter.

Hartley’s heart was pounding in his chest, making his blood rush in his ears.

The boy took a step forward to enter the elevator.

He couldn’t do this.

Hartley darted forward, bumping into the boy as he passed, their shoulders connecting hard and Hartley tried to ignore the brief feeling of skin on hot skin.

“Hey!” The boy yelled behind him but Hartley didn’t even bother to look back, hurrying out toward the pool and away from the cute boy with the bright smile. “Jerk,” he heard the boy mutter.

Hartley walked passed the pool, not bother to even look at the water, both in the pool and the ocean surrounding them, and hurried down the deck toward the stairs that would lead to another deck that had another elevator.

The trip was a blur, both figurative and literally as Hartley tried to force his eyes to remain dry. He entered the too large, too expensive first class rooms his parents had bought him (they had their own, separate rooms) and fell face first onto the bed.

He was such a idiot.

What a waste of a Spring Break.


	2. Hay Fever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flowers hate Hartley and he hates them back

2013

The sneeze echoed through the main lab and Hartley tried to his best to ignore the snickering going on around him. He sneezed again, barely getting the rough paper towel up to his nose in time.

He was going to kill Cisco.

The man had been an annoyance since the day he started – a personal demon sent from Hell to torment him. The man was irreverent, childish, and a nuisance. The fact that, if their circumstances were different, the man would actually be kind of cute was just more salt in that wound.

How can Harrison tolerate this? Despite Cisco’s genius, wouldn’t these flaws warrant some kind of action on his part?

Because this was going too far.

The glass vase sat innocently enough on Cisco’s desk, just a few yards from Hartley’s own desk, and the daisies it contained might have been lovely if not for the fact they were killing Hartley one sneezing fit at a time.

Hartley blew his nose once again, trying to stop any further bouts of sneezing for a few more moments. His nose felt raw and painful and, he was sure, was bright red to go along with his eyes. The only things available to stop the river of snot flowing from his nose were paper towels that were not meant to be used on one’s face more than once, much less repeatedly. He was certain the paper had rubbed the top layer of skin off his nose.

He glowered over at the flowers as they sat on Cisco’s desk, mocking him.

‘ _His mother’s birthday my ass_ ,’ Hartley thought bitterly, looking back to his computer screen.

By all means, he should go home and away from from cruel and unusual torture but he refused to even consider it. He was not going to let Cisco drive him out of his own workplace. He was here first, damn it!

“Hartley, do you have the calculations for the – woah!” Cisco stopped a few feet from him, staring at Hartley in open alarm. Then he smirked. “What happened to you, Rudolph?” 

Hartley’s scowled darkened.

“You know damn well what - _achoo_!”

Cisco grinned, holding up his hands, catching on quick.

“Sorry, Hartley,” he laughed, shaking his head. “I didn’t know you were allergic but I couldn’t keep them out in my car! They’d wilt.”

“Just get them out of here, Cisco!” Hartley scowled.

“Fine,” Cisco rolled his eyes before turning to his desk and picking up the colorful vase of daisies. “I’ll take them to the break room. You never go in there anyway.” Then, muttered softly: “Jerk.”

Hartley sneezed after him.

 

2015

The picture was framed and on display on the side table by the couch. It was a family photo, all of the Ramons in swimsuits and a bright blue ocean behind them. Cisco was easy to pick out, even though is face was even more babyish than now.

He was wearing garishly bright yellow swim trunks.

Sitting in Cisco’s apartment, wearing the other man’s borrowed clothes ( _‘No pictures, Cisco!’_ ), with a cup of honeyed tea on the coffee table and a few hundred crumpled tissues around him, Hartley found he missed his cell in the Pipeline.

At least pollen couldn’t get to him down there... at least he wouldn’t have come across this ghost from his past.

It could have just been a coincidence but Hartley knew it wasn’t.

He remembered that Spring Break almost ten year ago, remembered his small crush on the mysterious boy at the pool and the subsequence humiliated but self-imposed exile to his rooms for the rest of the trip.

Apparently, his memory wasn’t as good as he had thought but there was no mistaking it now.

He was sure of two things: one being that Cisco was the boy from the cruise and the other was that God hated him. That had to be the reason for this.

Hartley muffled a sneeze with his hand and groaned.

Obviously, Cisco didn’t remember those few seconds of a run in with him and so didn’t recognize him when they met again. The real mystery was how did Hartley miss it? Those few moments had haunted him for months afterward, the ultimate proof that Hartley was as awkward and emotionally disturbed as he had always feared.

He had gotten over that adolescent fear after a few years, realizing all teenagers were awkward excuses for human beings, but still, it had been the experience he had reminded himself of whenever he considered talking to a guy. 

Hartley looked up at the front door, the jingle of keys drawing his attention, and couldn’t help but tense at the sound. Like Evil Wells would bother with the front door.

“Hey, Hart!” Cisco greeted as he pushed the door open, one arm holding onto a bag of groceries. “I got you some allergy stuff.” He smiled, kicking the door closed behind him. “Thought I’d get some before you got snot over everything I own.”

Hartley would have snorted if his nose wasn’t completely stopped up.

“You might be a little too late for that.”

Cisco wrinkled his nose but tossed Hartley a small, pink box.... then a yellow one... then a bottle of cough syrup.

“I don’t have a cold, Cisco,” Hartley said nasally, staring at the syrup.

“Yeah, well, I figured it couldn’t hurt,” Cisco grinned as though what happened between them in the past few years had never happened. He and Caitlin had been doing that a lot lately.

God definitely hated him.

 

2016

The first thing Hartley noticed as he walked into his office in Mercury Labs was the vase on his desk, filled with flowers of various, vibrant colors. He stopped dead in his tracks, tensing as he waited for the pollen to assault him and send his day crashing to a halt.

It took a few more moments for him to notice that the petals were made of silk.

Relaxing ever so slightly, Hartley approached the flowers and plucked the card out of the clear, plastic holder.

_DID I SCARE YOU?_  
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!  
SEE YOU LATER TONIGHT <3  
-CR 

Hartley scoffed, putting the card down to stare at the gift. He supposed he should be glad it wasn’t a stuffed animal or a box wrapped in Harry Potter themed wrapping paper.

He and Cisco had only gone on a handful of dates so far but, he thought at least, they had gone well. Dinners, movies, things like that.

Were they at the flower stage now? He had never actually gotten flowers from someone before and the only time he had sent any was for Mother’s Day that year, wanting to keep the still strained but slowly repairing relationship with his parents going.

The flowers were oddly... nice. 

Especially since, for once, they weren’t trying to kill him.


	3. The Stars, too

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Changed the fic title and named this chapter to be Spring Awakening references. Because I can.

The house was an old, three bedroom Craftsman from the 1920s, located in a fairly well-off neighborhood, at the end of a cul-de-sac, surrounded by old, broad trees. It was quiet, reasonably close to STAR Labs, and it was cheap.

It was also a disaster zone.

The wooden siding was rotting where it hadn’t already falling off, the railing around the porch was in shambles, almost every window was broke, and the yard was more jungle than lawn with grass and weeds so thick they covered the walkway up to the front of the house.

They had bought it immediately.

Neither Hartley nor Cisco were in any hurry to move out of their shared apartment and they had the time and the money that it would take to revive the house back into a home.

“Cisco?” Hartley called out over the tingling of broken glass as he swept the debris covering the kitchen floor into a neat pile to be thrown away. He could hear his fiance’s wandering footsteps in the grass outside. Cisco didn’t see the point in cleaning up when they were going to start demo in a few days.

Hartley sighed and leaned the broom against the ugly Formica countertop – probably the one thing he was looking forward to destroying the most out of the whole place, so much so that he was planning to use his gloves on it, just to make sure every inch of it was destroyed – and walked through the house to the back door where he could hear Cisco muttering.

The back door dragged across the wood, the top hinge missing, and Hartley stepped out onto the large back porch. The spring evening was warm but the wind was still cold. Hartley wrapped his arms around himself and looked out at his soon-to-be husband.

Cisco was walking around the knee-high grass, a notebook in his hands, scribbling furiously. Occasionally, he’d look up, spread his arms out wide, then jot something down.

“What are you doing?” Hartley called from the porch, walking down the woobly, wooden stairs a few steps before sitting down on them.

Cisco looked up and flashed him a smile before he jogged over.

“Look it!” He held the notebook out to Hartley.

Hartley took it and looked down at the drawing covering the paper. It was a map of sorts of the backyard. The parameter was measured out and the few things they wanted to keep about the yard was drawn in in black ink. In green ink, over the map, were a improvement ideas. Across the lined paper were plans. There large workshop, easily the size of a two car garage, was drawn in the back right corner where they planned to build some of their ideas, and a BBQ pit closer to an enlarged back porch and patio. Large rectangles labeled ‘flower beds’ lined the house and fence they planning to put up.

In the middle of the yard, next to the large oak tree they both agreed on keeping, was a swing set.

Hartley smiled at the stick-figure swing.

“You remember I get hay fever, right?” Hartley asked lightly, glancing up at Cisco over his glasses.

“They have allergy friendly flowers,” Cisco rolled his eyes, moving to sit down beside Hartley. “Or we could be responsible and plant veggies or something.”

“Maybe,” Hartley agreed, leaning his shoulder against Cisco. “Swing set?”

“One of those that have a fort attached to it,” Cisco grinned widely. “And a slide. Has to have a slide. I had one of those growing up.”

“I didn’t,” Hartley remarked, looking at the plans and not seeing anything he’d want to change. “Mansion in the middle of the city meant no yard...”

“Your childhood is so tragic,” Cisco put on a fake pout. They both knew Hartley wasn’t that torn up about his childhood, just his teen years.

“Shut up,” Hartley shook his head, smiling. “Any need for a swing set is still a few years away anyway.”

“Yeah, well,” Cisco took back his notebook and looked down at the drawing. “We already have a bedroom planned and room for another if we decide on more, why not a few other things?”

Children were an agreed upon definite in their future, it was just the question of how many that was up for debate.

Hartley nodded. He slipped his arm under Cisco’s and took his hand in his own, lacing their fingers together. He looked up at the darkening sky and wished that they were farther away from the city to actually see the stars at night.

“Remember that cruise?” Hartley asked suddenly. Years ago, after he had discovered that picture of a teenaged Cisco, he had told him about that that little twist of fate. Later, after they had been dating for a few weeks, he had told Cisco about the horrifying crush he had developed on him during that short week and his over-dramatic sulking after he had screwed up that first meeting.

“The one where you fell instantly in love with me?” It was something Cisco had yet to let him live down.

“Yes, that one,” Hartley rolled his eyes.

“What about it?” Cisco grinned, squeezing Hartley’s hand.

“Do you think that’d be a good honeymoon?” Hartley asked, still looking up at the sky.

Cisco considered it for a moment, following Hartley’s gaze.

“I wouldn’t mind it,” he admitted after a moment before a smirk pulled at his full lips. “We could recreate that little nightmare of yours... give it a better ending.”

Hartley huffed out a laugh.

“I don’t think I want to relive any of my teenage memories,” he shook his head, looking back at Cisco. “But I wouldn’t mind making new ones.”

Cisco met Hartley’s gaze and leaned in for a kiss.

“Here’s to new memories.”


End file.
